New UL coach Napier must assemble coaching staff

“We are absolutely thrilled to identify a head football coach with the experience and success that Billy Napier brings to the University of Louisiana,” UL athletic director Bryan Maggard said in a statement issued Friday afternoon.
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Rob Sale is a candidate to join Billy Napier's new UL coaching staff.(Photo: John Amis/AP)

As soon as former Arizona State Billy Napier was officially named as UL’s new head coach football coach Friday, replacing the fired Mark Hudspeth, attention immediately turned to the staff Napier must now put together.

The Arizona Republic and azcentral reported after the hiring that Arizona State offensive line coach Rob Sale “could be a candidate to join Napier at Louisiana, potentially as offensive coordinator.”

It could not be immediately confirmed, however, if that will be the case.

Sale is a Monroe native who started on the offensive line at LSU, playing from 1999-2002, and coached the offensive line at UL Monroe in 2016.

He also coached the offensive line at Georgia in 2015, worked under current UL Monroe coach Matt Viator at McNeese State including time as co-offensive coordinator prior to that, and was a strength and conditioning assistant and offensive analyst at Alabama from 2007-11 – crossing over for one year with Napier there.

Current Cajun assistants were told to continue recruiting when Hudspeth was fired, and Napier is expected to at least meet with them all before completing his staff.

It remains to be seen, however, how many, if any, bridge hires Napier will make.

At least one Cajun assistant under Hudspeth has ties to Napier: longtime recruiting coordinator and tight ends coach Reed Stringer, who coincidentally was player development coach at Clemson during Napier’s second and last season there as offensive coordinator in 2010.

Also Friday, an unconfirmed report from Yahoo Sports said Napier’s new five-year contract will pay $1.47 million in 2018 if all incentive-clauses bonuses are met and that he will have a $2 million pool to hire assistant coaches -- much more than Hudspeth had to work with during any of his seven seasons at UL.

Hudspeth took UL to five New Orleans Bowls, winning the first four, but he ended with three straight losing seasons, including 5-7 this year.

On the same day Napier’s hiring was made public, meanwhile, one longtime UL recruited pledge decommitted.

Collins Woods, a receiver from Blount High in Alabama, tweeted thanks to Hudspeth and longtime UL Alabama recruiter Mitch Rodrigue, the Cajuns’ offensive line coach the last seven years, “for showing plenty of love throughout this recruiting process.”

Woods, though, also tweeted “it is best for me to weigh my options more” and said he would “re-open my recruitment.”

Woods recently has been receiving recruiting attention from Navy.

With the NCAA’s new early signing period opening Wednesday, UL’s other five known commits remained pledged to the Cajuns as of Friday afternoon.